


The Universe to Follow

by pterawaters



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Everyone else is dead, Future Fic, Med School Lydia Martin, Multi, Not Beta Read, On the Run, Slow Build, Threesome - F/M/M, Werewolf Stiles Stilinski
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-07
Updated: 2013-01-08
Packaged: 2017-11-15 21:17:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/531822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pterawaters/pseuds/pterawaters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After being left alive to grieve the loss of his entire pack, again, Derek manages to save Stiles, but he needs medical help and he needs to hide from the hunters dead-set on finishing off Derek's pack. Lydia left Beacon Hills behind for good when she broke up with Jackson and went to med school. She should have known that she'd be dragged back in, eventually. Not only that, but she harbored a fugitive suspected of multiple murders and property crimes. The only thing left to do is go on the run, all three of them, until they can take down those responsible for decimating their pack.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. An Arrival and a Departure

“The ashes of your existence will fertilize the soil for the universe to follow.”  
― Richard Kadrey, _Sandman Slim_  


There's pressure and pain on Stiles' neck as he comes to, Lydia's familiar voice in his ear asking, "...gone? Everyone? "

" _Yes_ , Lydia," Derek's voice replies to her and Stiles can _feel_ Derek, even though his voice came from at least six feet away. Stiles' arms aren't nearly that long, are they? No, they're not. His whole body feels strange and loose, like his skin isn't holding him in anymore and he's floating on a sea of nightmares. "I couldn't... They... There was nothing I could do. And then they left me. Alive. As a _punishment_. They didn't realize they hadn't finished Stiles off."

"You should have taken him to the hospital," Lydia replies. "He's going to hemorrhage out before that bite you gave him takes effect and they'll have been right. _God_ I'm glad I stopped hanging out with you losers after high school."

" _Please_ , Lydia," Derek says in a voice that's softer than Stiles has ever heard from him, except maybe when he talks about his parents during their infrequent middle-of-the-night talks. Stiles tries to move, tries to tell his friends he's still here and he's listening. "Just figure out how to save him here. I can't exactly explain the bullet wounds and I just _know_ if they find out he's still alive, they'll come after him and anyone in their way. Just, just do it."

Lydia sighs and the pressure on Stiles' neck lets up a little. A soft hand brushes over his forehead and then Lydia tells Derek in that no-nonsense medical voice that Stiles grew up hearing from Scott's mom, "I've got a few supplies here and enough vodka to drown a horse. But I'm going to need saline and blood."

"Take mine."

After a short pause, Lydia tells Derek, "Are you even a match? If I give him the wrong blood – and who _knows_ what sort of immune factors a werewolf's blood even has – it could _kill him_. He's still human for a few hours, at least, Derek. I need O-negative. Five units, to be sure."

Stiles feels lips on his hand, _fuck that hurts, what's wrong with my hand?_ and Derek's footsteps gallop away. Something warm and wet hits Stiles' head, just shy of his hairline and Lydia whispers in his ear, "Don't you dare die on us, Stilinski. I don't think Derek will survive this without you. _I_ won't survive this without you. Maybe it's selfish, but I don't want to be the only one left alive who knew, who _really_ knew Jackson, the wolfiness and everything. And I'm going to need that ruthless brain of yours."

Stiles manages to get his eyes to flutter open, meeting Lydia's and asking through her gasp of surprise, "Why?"

Lydia swallows and presses against what Stiles now realizes is the slit in his throat that must have just missed the major artery. Oh, god, and there's a bullet in him somewhere. Maybe near the searing pain in his hip. " _Because_ ," she says, dropping a kiss to his forehead, her voice low and harsh, "we're going to get revenge."

"Oh, good," Stiles replies as a wave of dark, sickening night crashes over him again and he loses his grip on Lydia's voice.

~~**~~

The blood bank in Lydia's neighborhood of LA is laughably easy to break into and everything is so well organized that even Scott could have figured out what to bring back to Lydia's apartment. The thought of Scott, the red light in his eyes going out as his head rolled at Derek's feet, makes Derek's breath hitch and his head swim. He doesn't have time for this. While he has to grab onto a cabinet – leaving his prints, god damn it – until he gets his balance back, Stiles is dying.

No. Derek won't let Stiles die. He'd sat by, chained from neck to knees and electrocuted half to death as he watched the rest of his pack executed one by one. He hadn't been able to save them. Stiles is the one he can save. He throws the blood and various needles and tubes and saline into the passenger seat of his car and brakes a dozen traffic laws on the way back to Lydia's place. 

At least giving Stiles the bite had been an easy decision. It had been one of the things they'd talked about during their midnight discussions, which happened more and more frequently as life got weirder and more dangerous and _someone_ had to keep watch. Derek has never thanked Stiles for keeping him company, keeping him awake and alert, but since Stiles kept coming back, Derek figures he knew. 

Derek hasn't told Stiles how he felt about those late night talks and that he's been slowly falling in love for _years_ , but it doesn't matter. What Derek wants doesn't matter. Stiles' life matters. 

As soon as Derek gets close enough to the apartment, he narrows in on Stiles' heartbeat, gut clenching at the way it sounds so sluggish, so slow. So fucking slow. He tries to summon up some rage – at the hunters who had done this, at Lydia for making him go get blood, even at Stiles for trying to die – but he just can't. Derek has no more anger left to give, only grief and a crushing sense of panic and dread. Bursting into the apartment, he shoves the supplies at Lydia, who has a pair of tweezers two inches into Stiles' thigh. 

"Bastards couldn't just shoot him through the heart," she practically growls and Derek clenched his teeth around the thought that Lydia's immunity kept her from becoming a wolf. She would have made a damn fine one. "They had to wound him first and then slit his throat like a pig. The indignity of it all just makes me so fucking _pissed_!" 

Derek thinks maybe Lydia cares more about Stiles than she's ever let on. Huh. He and she actually have something in common for once. Looking down at Stiles' pale face, at the way his chest barely rises and falls around his breaths, Derek asks, "What can I do? Tell me how I can help." 

Without missing a beat, her mind faster than lightning, Lydia replies, "Rinse your hands with some alcohol and then hold this. I'll get a line for the blood going." 

Derek does as she asks and watches Lydia as she starts a line, tapping out all the bubbles and then slips the needle into Stiles' arm like it's nothing. He tells her, "You're going to make a good doctor." 

"Yeah, maybe," she agrees, taking the tweezers from him and wrestling the bullet out of Stiles' muscle, throwing it so it clatters spent on the kitchen floor. "In case you haven't noticed, Beacon Hills left me a wreck. I didn't even get into Stanford, Derek. _Stanford_! I am meant for so much more than being a doctor, but after all the mayhem and death – could you hand me that pack of sutures? – after Peter and the way he literally drove me crazy, med school was all I could handle. So yeah, maybe I'll be a great doctor. Maybe I'll be the best doctor in the country. But I could have been better." 

Derek knows she doesn't want an apology, so he says nothing. He hands Lydia things as she asks for them and keeps pressure on the wound in Stiles' neck. He agrees with Lydia – this is no way for Stiles to be killed. He isn't prey, he is pack and pack doesn't die like _this_. 

When Lydia moves to work on the neck wound, Derek takes Stiles' hand and holds it against his mouth, not quite kissing it. He counts the pulses in the artery of his wrist, stronger and stronger with every pint of blood Lydia pours into him. He pulls away some of Stiles' pain, even though the guy is unconscious and can't feel Lydia's needle sewing up his wounds. 

"I read about how to do all the different sutures," she says as she works, her voice quiet like they're at a funeral (a comparison Derek hates his brain for). "I only practiced three of them before I ran out of pig shoulder. I guess it doesn't matter if he scars, since you gave him the bite. He'll heal." She pauses with her needle in the air for a brief second, saying, "He could die instead, I suppose." 

Derek doesn't agree with her. Stiles won't die. He can't. Derek _won't_ be the sole survivor. Not again. He says, "Some scars stay with you and even the bite can't cure them."

"I know _the bite_ only ever means trouble," Lydia replied, hanging a bag of saline and then sitting down on the opposite side of the dining room table where Stiles was laid out. She laughs a little and says, "Remember that one kid? Ran afoul of the alpha pack junior year?"

"Charlie," Derek nods. "He bit half a dozen people before I could run him out of town. Never even realized he was a beta and it didn't work that way."

They work in near silence until Lydia sits back and pulls Stiles' wrist into her lap, taking his pulse. "This is all I can do," she says, meeting Derek's eyes, hers shining with tears she blinks back. Derek notices that none of them fall and wonders when Lydia learned not to cry.

Derek learned the night he realized he was responsible for his family's death, when Laura insisted there wasn't time for it and they didn't know if the hunters would come for them, too. Derek learned to hide his tears the way Laura hid hers. 

He moves around the table to sit next to Lydia and puts an arm around her. "Thank you."

Lydia must have been tired, because she settled into Derek's embrace without a fight, leaning her head on his shoulder. He didn't look, but he knew she was keeping her eyes open, keeping a watch on Stiles. He knew because he was doing it, too.

~~**~~

Lydia feels it when Derek falls asleep. His weight shifts and instead of supporting her, she's supporting all two hundred pounds of him. Going to med school was supposed to mean leaving this shit behind. It wasn't supposed to mean sitting in her kitchen in the middle of the night, breathing shallowly because she's slowly being crushed to death by a werewolf and waiting for the one boy who ever realized she was smart to wake up. Except he won't be a boy anymore, will he? Stiles will either be a werewolf, or he'll be dead. Lydia knows the chances of him being immune are next to nothing.

God damned werewolves. When Lydia left Jackson, she thought she'd be done with all of this. She'd missed him so much, but at least she'd been alive. Now, what? Hunters might be after Stiles. Which means they will probably come after her. When Derek showed up at her door, Stiles half-dead in his arms, she should have called the cops. She should have done anything except let these god damned werewolves back into her life.

She's been ignoring Jackson's calls for two years, but she can't _not_ save Stiles. She's not that cold-hearted.

Lydia lets Derek sleep on her for about half an hour before poking him in the face until he wakes up. "You're too big," she says, but it doesn't come out the insult she expected it to be. Derek grunts and slides to the floor, pillowing his head on one of his big arms and falling back asleep. Lydia wonders how much trust it takes for a werewolf who's recently lost his pack to sleep in your presence. Maybe Derek is just exhausted from everything and would have passed out anywhere, but Lydia doesn't think so. She has a sneaking suspicion that Derek could stay awake for weeks if he needed to.

Sometimes Lydia wonders if surviving Peter's bite made her feel like pack to the werewolves. She's not one of them, but she's not a normal human being anymore. Derek could have gone to Deaton in Sacremento, he could have just gone to a fucking hospital, but he came to Lydia. Honorary pack member Lydia. Almost, but not quite Lydia.

Around dawn, she notices that the scrapes on Stiles' knuckles have healed. He probably won't even need that last bag of stolen saline, but she'll keep it anyway. You never know when someone in her life will go hypotensive. To celebrate Stiles' continued state of being alive, Lydia makes herself a mimosa and tries not to think about exactly how she's turning into her mother. 

After her first mimosa is drained and a second is halfway gone, Lydia feels pleasantly buzzed on her empty stomach and decides to go check on Stiles' sutures. If he's healing anywhere as quickly as Jackson always did, he's going to need them removed soon. She's not prepared for the doorbell to ring. 

Derek is out the back with Stiles in his arms before Lydia can even turn around to ask about his plan, so she pulls her hair back and slips into her favorite pair of flats. Lydia Martin does not entertain guests barefoot. "Who is it?" she calls sweetly as she goes up onto her toes to look through the peephole in the door. 

"LAPD, ma'am," a man's voice calls through the door, matching the badge and ID held up to her peephole. And _please_. Lydia is twenty three years old. She's not a "ma'am," thank you very much. "We're looking for an old acquaintance of yours. Derek Hale?"

A slice of fear grabs Lydia's chest, but she's used to fighting it down and pasting on a smile. She takes one second to use the mirror next to the door to wipe away any stray make up that lasted through the night and then opens the door. There are two plainclothes police there, probably detectives if her long history of watching forensics shows taught her anything. She smiles at the woman and beams at the man as she replies, "Derek? I haven't seen him in years. Why?" 

"He's a suspect in several crimes, Miss Martin." Ah, there is the Miss. "He left fingerprints at a break-in that happened last night in this neighborhood. You're sure you haven't seen him?"

"No," she insists, not liking the way the woman tries to look around her and into the house. "I'm sorry, my place is a wreck. Med school, you know. Otherwise I'd invite you in."

"I'm sure," the man nods, putting a hand on his partner's shoulder and frowning at her. The subtle sexism in the gesture doesn't escape Lydia, but it's working for her at the moment, so she doesn't protest. But then the woman hits her partner in the stomach and points to a red, tacky-looking puddle dripped across the edge of Lydia's welcome mat. Blood. Stiles' blood. Fantastic. "Miss, I'm going to have to ask you to step outside."

Lydia does what she does best, even after one and a half mimosas on an empty stomach, and thinks quickly. "Well, okay, but I don't see why a couple of cats fighting on my porch means you've got the right to invade my privacy! You'll be hearing from my lawyer!" 

The cops both draw their guns and leave Lydia out on the porch, which is a stupid move because as soon as she's out of their line of sight, she stalks off into the morning air, wishing she'd thought to wear a coat. At least she's wearing flats, so she can start jogging a block later. "Where the fuck are you, Derek?" she says to herself, but it doesn't surprise her when a black Camero pulls up to the curb and Derek growls, "Get in."

Lydia does as asked, looking over to see Stiles still unconscious in the backseat. She buckles her seatbelt, turns up Derek's heater, and tells him, "I hope you know you've ruined my life. There is evidence _all over_ my house and aiding and abetting a criminal is one of those things that gets you kicked out of med school, not to mention jail time!"

"They won't find us," Derek says, merging onto the freeway, which is just starting to fill up with rush-hour commuters. 

"Yeah, thanks," Lydia grumbles. "That assurance doesn't make my ruined life any easier to swallow."

From the back, Lydia hears Stiles murmur, like he's still asleep, "'s okay, baby. You can spit if you want."

Lydia glances over at Derek and she's pretty sure they roll their eyes in unison. She frowns and says, "I know why you did it, but you're totally going to regret making _that_ into a werewolf."

Derek sighs and says, "I know."


	2. Goodbye Outside World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles is definitely a werewolf and the gang breaks ties with their former lives.

Stiles wakes up to someone shaking him and the world feels too loud and too bright. "Whaa?" he asks, blinking at a Derek-shaped shadow. There's a familiar scent nearby as well. Lydia.

"Time to go, Sleeping Beauty," Lydia says from Stiles' left, her skin soft next to his cheek and her heartbeat deafening. "We need to move."

"Those officers are still talking to the teller," Derek says, his voice in that assuring tone he gets when he's trying to be alpha-leader-man. "We have a little time."

"Teller?" Stiles asks, blinking until he sees that he's got an arm over one each of Derek's and Lydia's shoulders, his torso slung between them. He wonders if the memories of dying were true and he made it to heaven. "Did we rob a bank in heaven?" he asks.

"We didn't _rob_ anyone," Derek grumps, his voice gravelly as he helps Stiles across a giant-ass parking lot.

"Not _yet_ ," Lydia adds. "We should go for something terribly mundane. Like a Toyota."

"I don't know how to hotwire a Toyota."

Okay, Stiles is fairly certain his version of heaven is an action movie starring the two hottest people he knows. 

"How difficult can it be, Derek?" Lydia snipes, pulling on Stiles' arm so all three of them head toward a silver Camry. "This is one of the most popular cars on the market. Do you know how hard it will be for them to find us if we drive this one?"

"Wait," Stiles asks, putting more weight on his feet and finding that his balance is really fucking good for just having woken up. "What's going on here? Not that I'm entirely opposed to hotwiring a car and going for a joy ride, but–"

Derek grabs Stiles face and makes him meet his flashing-red eyes. It's terrifying and compelling and when Derek says, "Just shut up and follow my lead," Stiles feels like he _has_ to nod and look away. If he was a dog, he'd be tucking his tail between his legs right now and–

"Oh, my god! You–! And I'm–! And everyone–!" Stiles doesn't think he's in heaven anymore. Being a werewolf hasn't ever been his idea of a good time." _Oh_."

"I think he's finally on the same page," Lydia says, patting Stiles' cheek before wrapping her arms around herself. She looks like she needs a coat. Is Stiles wearing a coat? He feels warm. Nope, just a torn and bloody t-shirt. Nice. "Can we just get out of here already? We have shopping to do."

"So..." Stiles says as he watches Derek wrench open the driver's door latch and duck under the steering wheel. "We're stealing a car because we're on the run from the police and Lydia wants to go shopping. Except for the fact that I'm starting to remember really, very, very bad things about what happened in the recent past to people I care about and the fact that I can see that pigeon five hundred yards away is taking a shit on that Hummer, which means I'm so a werewolf now, thanks Derek, this is starting to feel like a normal day."

Derek glances over his shoulder like Stiles is crazy before getting back to work, the car rumbling to life a few seconds later. Derek takes the driver's seat, of course, and Lydia pushes Stiles toward one of the rear doors, so he obediently sits in the back. 

Stiles doesn't watch where they're going because he's fairly certain that Scott is dead. Everyone is dead. Allison. Boyd. Stiles knows what Jackson's intestines looked like, since the hunters hacked him clean in half. 

From the front, Derek rumbles in a low, steady voice, "Calm down, Stiles."

"No," he growls back, wondering if that flare of heat through his body is what makes a werewolf's eyes flash. "We need to go back. We need to go home and find those motherfuckers and make them pay."

"Calm. Down."

Stiles snaps his teeth before he realizes that they feel different and his fingers – his _claws_ – are caught in the upholstery. "Shit," he says, his voice slurring over teeth that are too big for his mouth. Looking up, he sees Derek's furious expression in the rearview and Lydia sneering at him from the front passenger seat like she's wishing she had a rolled up newspaper to use on him. "How am I supposed to fucking _calm down_ when _everyone is dead_? Arg!"

"Calm down before someone notices you and calls the freaking cops!" Derek cries, his voice tinged with that frustration he always used to have around Scott. Scott. Damn it.

"Stiles, honey," Lydia says, snapping her fingers in front of his face. "Listen to me, okay?" She nods her head with so much emphasis that Stiles can't help but emulate her. "Good. Now just breathe with me, okay? In... Out..."

It strikes Stiles that he's having a panic attack, but instead of just being nauseating, painful, and terrifying, now his panic attacks come with a side helping of lycanthrope. Awesome. 

He tunes out Lydia's voice and presses one hand to his chest – ow, sharp claws! Ouch. Okay. Stiles breathes in for five beats of his own heart and out for five and keeps doing that until his rage feels like a low, simmering afterthought rather than tidal wave of misery.

Once he's calm, Stiles realizes he can hear the steady beat of Derek's heart, almost in time with Stiles' and he wonders if Derek somehow accomplished that on purpose. Alpha powers for the win. Lydia's heartbeat, on the other hand, runs thump-thump, thump-thump faster and it makes Stiles want to chase her down and press her into the ground with his body. It's not that different a feeling from the way he felt about her in high school, so he does what he always did back then and pushes the feeling away.

Stiles runs a finger over his teeth and feels that yes, okay, he's back to normal. Sweet. Stiles always knew he would make a better werewolf than Scott. Not that he'd _ever_ wanted this, but it was better than being dead. The thought made him remember kneeling, off-kilter because of the bullet in his leg, and locking eyes with Derek as one of the hunters drew a blade across Stiles' throat. Stiles felt his hand drifting up toward his neck and he prodded the skin there, looking for the wide scar, but it felt the same as always.

"You're fine," Lydia says, turning around in her seat and pulling Stiles' hand away from his throat. She doesn't let it go like he was expecting, though. She just sits there, half turned toward him, holding his hand and watching as Derek drives their stolen car toward the airport.

"Uh," he says as Derek actually takes the turn off to the airport, "we're wanted by the cops, there's no way we're going to be able to buy plane tickets. Not without some really awesome fake identities."

"We're just switching cars," Derek says, driving past the airport proper and toward long-term parking. He turns to Lydia and asks in a completely deadpan voice, "Which car did we leave here, honey?"

Stiles narrows his eyes at them as Lydia smirks and points to a bright red convertible they can see through the fence that surrounds the place. "That one."

Derek nods, "Jaguar XKR. Got it."

"We're going to steal a Jaguar?" Stiles asks, visions of Grand Theft Auto running through his mind. He wonders how many stars they can get before being caught and then realizes, "My dad is going to kill me."

"Don't be stupid," Derek says, parking the Toyota on the street outside the lot.

"Yeah," Lydia adds, getting out of the car and then opening the back door and reaching for a sweater the owner of the car must have left there. She pulls it on and twirls like she's modeling it as she continues, "The Jaguar is the distraction." Then she leans close and Stiles thinks for half a second that she's going to kiss him. Of course she doesn't. She reaches into Stiles' jeans pocket – _Whoa, there!_ – and pulls out his phone before placing it in his hands. "I'm going to text you the location and plate number of a van or a truck or something big like that. Something we can sleep in. Find it and wait for us there."

Stiles almost asks why he can't just wait for them here, but then he realizes that one of them will distract the clerk, the other will probably be looking at records or something and, "You need a third face. Someone they haven't seen before to drive the van or whatever out of the lot."

Lydia gives Stiles a bright grin that makes his heart flip, "So smart!"

And then she and Derek are gone, walking toward the attendant's building at the entrance, their hands clasped together. The sight makes Stiles wonder if this was going to be a thing now. Derek and Lydia calling the shots and working together like Lydia had never left, with Stiles as the odd man out. And he doesn't even have Scott to bitch to anymore.

This is all so fucked up and Stiles is sure that if it weren't for the adrenaline still coursing through his system (and maybe the lycanthrope has something to do with it), he'd be sitting here crying silent, manly tears over the losses of his friends. As it stands, all he can do is sit in the back of the still-running Toyota and hold his phone tight, waiting for Lydia's call. There are seventeen texts and five calls from his dad and Stiles knows as soon as he gets Lydia's text, he's going to have to turn off his phone. He can't be the reason Derek gets caught and charged with Scott's and everyone's murders. Stiles can't.

~~**~~

"Please, Derek?" Stiles asks quietly, Derek thinks so that Lydia can't hear him. They're at a sandwich shop and Lydia's still ordering while Stiles and Derek are waiting for their food at the other end of the counter. Stiles seems to be losing an argument with his straw. His failure to drink a soda like a normal human being, along with his far-too-expressive eyes and the way Derek can feel his emotions now that Stiles is his beta all collaborate to convince Derek to at least think about changing his mind. "I can't just disappear without saying goodbye to my dad."

Derek knows it's safer to keep the batteries out of their phones. Hell, it would be even safer to toss them, but Derek knows the others are still hoping everything would get sorted out soon and they'll be able to go back home. There's definitely no going back until the hunters that killed Derek's pack are either dead or in jail. He doesn't even know their names, so Derek's pessimistic about finding them. Even if they do and he's exonerated from the murder charges, Derek broke into that blood bank. He doesn't even know what the punishment for something like that will be. Jail time? Community service?

It doesn't matter. The punishment for the murders he's accused of is life in prison and he can't exactly turn himself in and point a finger at the men responsible without explaining what he is. What his pack mates were. Now it's down to two of them again – alpha and beta – only this time, Derek's the alpha. He's responsible for their safety and he shouldn't let Stiles make that call. 

Sighing, Derek meets Stiles' eyes. If Derek had been given the chance to say goodbye to his parents before they'd died, he would have taken it with no hesitation. He can't deny Stiles the right. Besides, knowing Stiles, Derek thinks he'd likely make the call anyway, regardless of how it fit into their plans.

"Fine," he says, "but wait until we're done eating and we're ready to move, make him think we're headed south, and," Derek pauses, catching Stiles' shoulder in his hand to make sure he has his attention, "make him think I've kidnapped you and Lydia."

"What?" Stiles asks with an incredulous squawk. "No! I'm not–"

Derek all but flashes his power at Stiles in an attempt to get him to obey. "It'll make it easier for you to go back if we get caught! Stiles, just–"

"No," Stiles insists, his denial entirely too strong for Derek's liking, seeing as he's brand new to being a wolf. Stiles' instincts to follow his alpha should be stronger than this. But when has Stiles ever fit to Derek's expectations of him? Lydia starts walking toward them and Stiles lowers his voice again to barely above a harsh whisper. "Derek, listen. If they think you've kidnapped me and Lydia, they're going to put so much more energy into finding us. All of our faces will be on the news every hour and if someone does spot us, you'd better believe there will be roadblocks fencing us in. I'll tell Dad you're innocent and we're headed south and everything, but I won't tell him you forced me to come with you. No way. I'm in this until the end."

"Me too," Lydia says from beside Derek, stepping forward to face him and wrapping her hands around Stiles' elbow. "Don't even think about leaving me with some shoddy excuse about how you forced me into any of this. I want to know who killed Jackson and Allison and the others and I want to do some very painful things to them. Capiche?"

The fire in Lydia's eyes reminds Derek of Laura when she was still trying to figure out who had been responsible for the fire. He'd watched her rage helplessly for six years, the missing piece of information locked in Derek's guilty heart. No. This time he is going to let her have her revenge. He nods once and says, "Okay."

When they have their food, Derek leads them back out to the van they've stolen. The owner will be out of town for ten more days, so no one should come looking for it for awhile. By then, Derek figures they'll be three or four car swaps down the road. They sit in the back eating their sandwiches and Stiles calls his dad. Lydia meets Derek's eyes and jerks her head toward the door like she's asking if they should give Stiles some privacy, but Derek shakes his head. He's not willing to go so far away from Stiles and the van that he won't be able to hear the conversation, so he might as well stay here.

"Hey. Hey, Dad," Stiles says, cut off by his father's exclamation. Derek can hear the older Stilinski's voice through the phone, which feels a little like an invasion of Stiles' privacy, but mostly he wants to hear how much the police know and how far they have to make it out of town before the authorities stop looking for them. Once they announce on the news that Stiles is Derek's accomplice, the hunters will be after them again. Part of Derek hopes they do catch him, and finish him off this time, to stop him from running, running, running away again.

" _Stiles! Where are you? Your DNA is all over this crime scene, I thought you were_ dead _! What happ–_ "

" _Dad_ ," Stiles practically shouts to get his father to stop talking. "I'm okay. That two-eleven in LA that they're after Derek for? That was for me, but I'm all better now."

" _And the Martin girl?_ " the Sheriff asks and Stiles looks over to meet her eyes. Derek notices that tilt of Stiles' eyes that he never really understood before, but now he can feel that it's regret. It makes Derek's breath hitch and he wonders how he never figured it out before. 

"She's with us," Stiles assures his father. "She's safe. Say 'hi', Lydia." 

"Hey, Sheriff," Lydia says, her voice bright and bubbly. Derek knows the bright tone is a lie, and he can't tell if Lydia pulling off that lie perfectly makes him feel better or worse. Probably both. "I'm okay. We're just gonna go for a little trip while you people figure out which bastards murdered our friends." 

" _About that_ ," the Sheriff says and Stiles' eyes slide over to meet Derek's for half a moment before slipping away again. " _Is Derek there with you? He left fingerprints all over that blood bank, where he tripped the silent alarm, I might add. And he's the prime suspect in–_ "

"Dad. Dad, no," Stiles replies, reaching a hand out and grabbing onto Derek's forearm like he needs the contact. Now that he's a werewolf, he probably does. Derek puts his hand over Stiles' and tries not to read too much into it. "Derek didn't do it. The murders, I mean. I was there. I saw the guys who kill–" Stiles swallows like he can't bear to let the words out and make them true. "Well, they tried to get me too and we'd come home, but if they find out I'm still alive, they'll try to finish the job."

" _We can protect you, son. Just come on in and give your statement and we can get Derek cleared, too._ "

Stiles meets Derek's eyes and raises his brows. He actually thinks it's a good idea, doesn't he? Derek shakes his head and mouths, "Full moon," because it's only four nights away and Derek's not naïve enough to think he'll be released by then. If it were only himself he had to worry about, it wouldn't be an issue. Derek had spent full moons not shifting before, he could do it again. The issue was getting Stiles through his first moon without being killed by the hunters on their asses. Even Scott, who'd earned his alpha status in his own right, had been killed by these hunters. Derek isn't going to put anything past them.

When Stiles takes too long to answer, Derek grabs the phone from him and says, "I'm sorry, Sheriff. The only way you can help us now is by keeping Stiles' and Lydia's information out of the press and pushing your department to figure out who could have done this." Derek adds as an afterthought, "Besides me."

After a huff of breath that sounds resigned as well as angry, the Sheriff says, " _Put my son back on the line._ " Derek does as asked of him, of course. He knows better than to interfere with this conversation any longer. Stiles takes the phone and turns away, and he knows it for a silent plea for Derek to at least pretend he's not listening in.

When Lydia settles in against Derek's side, he looks down at her and lets her pull his arm around her shoulders. He doesn't quite understand why the action feels so comfortable, but it probably has to do with the fact that since he fell asleep on her the night before, Lydia has smelled faintly like him. And Lydia is the sort of girl who does this casual touching, even with people she's at best acquaintances with. "Do you want to call someone?" Derek asks her. "If you're going to do it, now would be the time."

"No," she says, her eyes unfocused but wide. "There's no one left."

"Not even your parents?" Derek asks. Sometimes he and Jackson would talk, especially after Lydia broke up with him, so Derek had gleaned a lot more information about Lydia than she probably knew. Last he'd heard, her parents were fine. Wouldn't she want them to know she was okay?

"They won't miss me," she insists with a shrug, turning to focus on Derek's face and give him a small, sad smile. "It's okay. I don't miss them, either."

Derek pulls his arm a little tighter, because he's sure that Lydia needs it, but she won't want to admit that she does. She's so much like Laura that way.

"Yeah, Dad," Stiles sighs, their conversation, which Derek has lost track of, ending. "I love you, too. See ya."

Stiles turns back around, wiping one of his eyes with the back of his hand. He gives Derek his phone and says, "I need you to take this from me."

Derek takes it without a word and turns it over, looking for the battery door, which it doesn't appear to have.

"Oh, my god, you're such a luddite," Lydia says, snatching the phone from Derek's hand and sitting up so she's no longer pressed against him. "The only way to be sure is to ditch it or destroy it. The batteries don't come out without cracking the case open and this model can be turned on remotely."

"Let's ditch them," Stiles says with a decisive nod. "My dad will find them and we'll get them back after..." Derek shares a look with Lydia and realizes that Stiles is the only one who still believes there will be an "after" after this. He pulls his own disassembled phone out of his pocket and hands it to Lydia. "We leave them here. Yours too, Lydia."

"I _know_ that," she huffs, adding her phone to the stack. She opens the sliding door of the van and sets all three phones on the curb next to them. "Goodbye, outside world," she says before turning around. Her eyes look glazed over despite her smile and Stiles looks even worse.

"I'll drive," Derek says, climbing into the driver's seat and leaning down to get the engine started. They've really got to get a set of keys to go along with their next car. He pulls out of the restaurant parking lot and heads toward the northbound freeway. They'll pass Beacon Hills on their way, but if Stiles' dad relayed their conversation to the other authorities, everyone will think they're headed for Mexico. The hunters who killed Derek's pack are definitely _not_ in Mexico.


	3. Fight and Flight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lydia takes the boys shopping for "disguises" but their trip doesn't go as planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One part gets a little gory, so be forewarned.

Lydia drifts off not long after they leave the LA metro area and when she wakes up again, farmland surrounds them. "Where are we?" she asks Derek, who's still in the qqdriver's seat, intent on the road ahead of them. Stiles sits in back, chin on his hand as he stares out the window.

"Heading north on ninety-nine," Derek says. "Well east of Beacon Hills."

Lydia nods and pictures California in her head, tracing their route from LA north. She wonders how long they should head north before stopping and hunkering down somewhere for a few days until it's safe to start looking for the hunters who ruined her life. Probably not too much longer. Every mile on the road is an opportunity for some state patrolman or overly invested citizen to spot them. 

As they pass a billboard advertising an outlet mall, Lydia declares, "We're going shopping before the stores close."

"No," Derek says and his lack of cooperation infuriates her.

"Listen here, buddy," Lydia says, poking his arm with one sharp finger. "This isn't _fun_ for me, this is about having more than one blood-spattered change of clothing and about disguising ourselves. Don't you tell _me_ , 'no,' Derek. I may be with you on this crazy mission or what have you, but don't for _one second_ think that you can order me around like one of your betas." 

From the back, Stiles makes a hesitant choking noise like he wants to get in on the conversation, but can't bring himself to find the words. Lydia doesn't care. She doesn't need him. She can win this argument on her own.

Which apparently she does, because Derek takes the exit the billboard suggested and follows the sign to the outlet mall. "We need to move further tonight," he says, parking right in front of the Banana Republic outlet. Lydia wonders if Derek actually has taste or if this is just left over from when he lived with his sister. "Find a motel somewhere quiet and just hide out for a day or two."

"Hiding out," Stiles agrees from the back, stretching his long limbs as he spills himself out of the van. "Hiding is good. Sleeping and eating? Also good."

Lydia follows, using Stiles' shoulder to steady herself as her legs get used to standing again. Okay, Lydia needs to buy a pair of heels and quickly, because she hates being so much shorter than either of her current companions. Plus, wearing heels makes her ass look cute, which makes her feel better and if Lydia's on the run with two delinquent werewolves, there's a lot of room for improvement as far as feeling good about her life choices goes.

"Come on," she tells Stiles, taking his elbow and pulling him toward the store. "We have a few hundred dollars to spend between the three of us. Let's see how well we can use it."

"I've been meaning to ask," Stiles says, looking over his shoulder at Derek, who follows silently, his eyes searching everywhere for danger. Lydia thinks his hypervigilance is overdoing it a little. They're almost two hundred miles from LA, have been driving a van no one knows is missing, and have barely stopped anywhere for supplies. No one will find them yet. "Where did we get this," Stiles lowers his voice to a whisper, " _giant wad of cash_ , you two have been pulling from all day?"

"We both emptied our bank accounts first thing this morning," Lydia explains, letting Stiles open the door for her and walking toward the first rack that catches her eye. There's an adorable newsboy cap in dark grey that she thinks will complement Derek's bone structure and help shield his face from any security cameras they might come across. She gives Stiles an assessing glance and decides he is _not_ a hat person. She does like what he's done with his hair recently, though. That buzz cut deserved to be left back in high school. 

"Man, now I feel like I'm mooching off you guys," Stiles complains, frowning when Lydia holds a dark red button-down shirt up to his chest to assess his size. Huh. Stiles is bigger than he appears to be. Must be the way he holds himself. "I could've chipped in."

Lydia scoffs. "Please. You're a freelance sports writer slash werewolf enthusiast who still lives with his father. The few hundred dollars you might have had in the bank wasn't worth sticking around for."

Stiles glares at Lydia and pushes away the shirt she holds out to him. "You're gonna take that back when all we can afford to eat is ramen."

Lydia wants to snipe back at Stiles, but after associating with him this long, she recognizes when his jokes are no longer jokes. "Sweetie," she says, holding his eyes with her own for a moment. "This is a group effort now, alright? You'll prove yourself useful, yet."

Shrugging, Stiles takes a sweater from the rack beside him, giving it an assessing look. Lydia gags and takes it away, hiding it under all the other sweaters lest some hapless fashion-challenged consumer like Stiles come along and think it's a good idea. "I _am_ a lot stronger now," he points out. "And I can smell that three different dudes tried on that shirt. I don't make Derek extra powerful as a alpha all by myself, though."

"That's the spirit," Lydia agrees with her brightest smile. She wonders if Derek will ever make more wolves or if he and Stiles will be half a pack for the rest of forever. She's betting on the latter for now, knowing how deep the wounds of their losses go. You can't just _replace_ a family you spent over half a decade making. Her dad's botched second marriage was good evidence of that. Thank god Kelly was unable to have children, because Lydia would have pitied the fuck out of ant kids they might have had when her philandering father and his dumbass wife split not much long afterward.

Three stores later, Lydia has managed to pull together a few outfits for each of them without spending too much of their money. As dusk falls over the outlet mall and Lydia leads the way to one last store, Derek stiffens and grabs her arm. "We have to get out of here," he growls. "Now."

"Okay," Lydia says wih a nod, her stomach dropping in anticipation.

Derek shoves her at Stiles and tells them, "Get to the car. Try not to get shot."

"Shit," Stiles says under his breath, one giant, hot hand on Lydia's lower back. "Let's go."

Glad she's still wearing her flats, Lydia runs alongside Stiles, heading for their van. A spray of concrete from a bullet hitting the wall above them – a warning shot – makes Lydia shriek a little as they duck and press their backs to a car for shelter. Lydia demands, "How did they find us?"

"I don't know," Stiles replies, wincing as another bullet hits above them. Lydia thinks the shooter must be pretty far away, not to be able to hit them with the cars from the lot in the way. "Stay low," Stiles orders, arching up to look over the hood of the red station wagon they're sheltered behind. "I'm gonna draw fire so Derek can jump them."

"What? No!" Lydia cries. "That sounds like an awful idea! You can't just leave me defenseless."

Stiles looks at her, really _looks_ , and then kisses her on the cheek. "You're Lydia Martin," he says with one corner of his mouth upturned, "you're never defenseless."

Lydia can't even respond to how Stiles is totally giving her more credit than she deserves before he's gone, running across the parking lot with a howl.

Lydia almost makes it back to the van before someone grabs her, sealing her mouth with his hand so her scream goes nowhere. He has a knife in his other hand, but he's not holding it tight enough, because Lydia is able to send it clattering away with one good punch to his forearm. The rest of Lydia's self-defense lessons kick in automatically until she's got him down on the ground, but his hands squeeze around her neck. Lydia can't pull or knock them away and she doesn't have time to think because her retinas are starved of oxygen and going black. So Lydia takes his eye out, cramming her thumb past the occipital muscles keeping it in place and severing all the tendons and nerves with her thumbnail. The eye in her hand feels hot and wet and it makes her feel more powerful and less grossed out than she thinks it should. Her attacker screams bloody murder and lets her go, hands clapping over the gaping wound.

Lydia gets her brain back, so she stands up and kicks the guy in the head, knocking him unconscious and putting him out of his misery. When Derek skids to a stop in front of her, wide-eyed and breathing hard, Lydia realizes the eye is still in her hand. With a grimace, she drops it on the man who'd tried to take her and asks Derek, "Stiles?"

The man in question skids to a halt beside them long enough to cry, "Run!" Then he's scooping up some of Lydia's bags along with her arm and hustling her forward, leaving Derek to bring up the rear. "How many?" Lyria asks as they run.

"Like seven or eight," Stiles replies, pulling Lydia around a sharp corner. "They're totally on the warpath. It's like Derek accidentally turned their brother."

"So _that's_ what this is about?" Lydia asks, dropping her voice as they duck between a line of cars. Derek's hand is hot on the small of her back and Lydia glares back at him until he removes it. Lydia Martin doesn't need chivalry, especially in the midst of running for her life. Directing her question at Derek, she asks, "You turn one guy and these psychos murder everyone you love?"

"He didn't turn, like he wanted," Derek replies, passing her and Stiles to take the lead. "He died and his mom got pissed."

Derek pulls Stiles forward by the hand, and Stiles pulls Lydia in turn, making her feel like she's playing a really dangerous kindergarten game. They weave their way through the parking lot, getting no closer to their van before men and women with guns cut them off. "Why would you even bite a hunter's son to begin with? And where are the cops? Somebody should have called this in by now."

Derek stops suddenly, as does Stiles, but Lydia stumbles against Stiles' back, which makes her feel like a moron. "I forgot about the cops." Derek says with that undercurrent of guilt Lydia hasn't heard from him since senior year of high school.

"There's sirens," Stiles adds and Lydia wants to suggest they abandon the few things they left in the van and hotwire another car, but she knows between the hunters closing in and the cops, there's no way they have enough time. The hunters are corralling them in one direction and Lydia can see it happening, but she doesn't know what else to do than to keep running in the safest direction, following as Stiles pulls her along.

The clear path leads past the American Eagle and out to the frontage road and Lydia thinks maybe they can run fast enough and far enough to find someplace to hide. And then a man holding a rifle steps out in front of them. Derek immediately puts himself in front of both Lydia and Stiles, so she has to watch around Derek's broad back as an SUV runs the man with the gun over. The vehicle screeches to a halt as the hunter blocking their path lands thirty feet away, unconscious and the passenger-side window rolls down.

From the driver's seat, Alan Deaton calls, "Get in!" Lydia has never been happier to see a veterinarian in her entire life.

~~**~~

Even though Deaton is driving them away from the fight, leaving the hunters scrambling to catch up with them before the cops close in, Stiles can't seem to calm down. Rage presses in on him, grinds into his chest and he can't breathe. He can't do anything except press his face against the cool window and pant as he tries to clear the red out of his vision. Something moves in his peripheral vision, one of the deafening heartbeats trapped in this metal box with him and Stiles snaps at it with sharp teeth. Yeah, it better squeal and shiver and hide in on itself! No one messes with St–

Alpha's roar breaks into Stiles' thoughts and he moves away without thinking about it. Alpha must want the scared, pretty one for himself. Maybe Stiles can go for the darker one instead. He makes a careful move forward, but Alpha growls at Stiles again before pinning Stiles into his seat and holding him close.

Words pour from Alpha's lips and Stiles struggles against them at first. Stiles _needs_ to hunt. He didn't let loose on the men with the guns even though they deserved to be ripped to shreds. Why can't he do it now? There's tasty treats trapped in here with Stiles and Alpha. Why not? Stiles screams in frustration.

After a few more minutes of Derek holding him and telling him to, "Calm down, Stiles," the red clears from his vision. Lydia looks at Stiles like she doesn't know him and he realizes he must have tried to attack her. Shit.

Stiles focuses on Derek's heartbeat for a few long seconds until he's able to shift back to human. He clears his throat and says, "I'm good now. Thanks." He hopes he's telling the truth.

Derek takes a long look at Stiles' face and Stiles can feel his cheeks heating up a little under the scrutiny, but he tries to stay calm and prove to Derek that he really can stop hugging Stiles now, thanks. Derek must believe him, because he lets go and settles himself in the seat next to Stiles', the aisle separating them and the sudden loss of contact making Stiles fight the reflex to grab at Derek for a few more moments. Lydia has retreated to the passenger seat at some point and Deaton catches Stiles' eye in the rearview mirror.

"So that's new," the vet says dryly, which makes Stiles scoff. He likes jokes as much as the next guy – hey, they're practically his bread and butter – but they just escaped from a gang of maniacs with guns and Stiles almost ate his friends. He's felt more jovial at funerals than he does right now.

"I'd rather this than dead," Stiles replies, holding Deaton's gaze until Deaton has to put his eyes back on the road. 

"It was close, too," Lydia says, her voice carrying not a trace of the fear and upset that's still marring her once-perfect façade. She's been doing this, locking this shit away, since she first saw Peter in alpha form outside that video store. Stiles hates it, hates that she never falls apart, like she's so much better at controlling her emotions than everyone else. Except now her lip trembles a little before she pulls it in and her eyes shine and Stiles can hear the way her heart's still beating too quickly. She takes a few long breaths and it goes back to normal and Stiles wonders if he'll ever get to see her really fall apart. She nods and puts on a matter-of-fact expression as she tells Deaton, "I had to stop him from bleeding to death in my kitchen. It was all very Dr. Quinn."

Derek huffs and leans forward, one of his hands each on Deaton's and Lydia's seats. "How did you find us?"

"The same way the hunters did," Deaton says, glancing back at Derek for a fraction of a second before putting his eyes back on the road. Stiles wonders what it would be like to be in a car crash without having to worry about surviving. That thought makes him look past Derek to make sure Lydia's wearing her seat belt, which she is. Of course she is. 

Wait, what? Like always, Deaton has to go about things in the most mysterious way possible. "Dude, can't you just tell us so we can get away clean this time?" 

Derek grunts in agreement and Stiles decides that now that he's part of Derek's pack, there are going to be some changes. First and foremost, Derek will have to learn to speak English, at least in Stiles' presence. This whole grunting, cave man thing might make him feel badass, but it just led to problems. Stiles knew. He'd seen it happen with Scott and the other betas. If he and Derek (and Lydia) were going to survive this, communication was going to be key.

Deaton takes a turn into a neighborhood, which Stiles thinks is a little risky collateral-damage-wise, and says, "They have a witch. She's been using a scrying spell to keep track of your movements."

"Oh, so the dark arts are okay in their book," Stiles says with a scoff, "but a little Lycanthrope is grounds for extermination? Hypocrites."

Derek looks back and tells Stiles, "They're not werewolf hunters, they're demon hunters. They'd have to know magic."

And that's it. That's all the information Derek seems willing to part with. So Stiles kicks him and says with a hysterical edge to his voice that he hates, "For guys who don't hunt werewolves, they did a bang-up job killing five of them and one and a half humans!"

Derek frowns and gives Stiles a glare that he knows is supposed to be an order to sit down and shut up or else, but Stiles can't help but want to push against it. Almost everyone he knows is dead. His life as a human is over. He's allowed to be pissed.

He's also allowed to keep his mouth shut about it until they aren't running for their lives, so Stiles clamps down on the urge to shift and jump Derek and just beat the crap out of him until Stiles feels better. It wouldn't even work. Stiles has been a werewolf for less than twenty-four hours. Derek has been one for almost thirty years, six of those as Alpha. Stiles would get his ass _kicked_.

Instead, he asks Deaton, "How do we know they aren't still following us?" Deaton points up and Stiles asks, "God? What are you, some sort of holy –" He cuts himself off when he sees the symbols painted on the ceiling of Deaton's SUV. A protection spell. Stiles should have known.

They drive right back out the other side of the neighborhood and out onto the open road again, this time heading west. As Derek sits back in his seat, the emotions rolling off him changing from itching for a fight to bone-weary regret, Stiles gets the sneaking suspicion that Deaton is driving them right back to Beacon Hills. 

Lydia asks the question Stiles won't and Deaton confirms his suspicion. "Home field advantage," Deaton says with that stupid fucking enigmatic grin of his. "Besides, who would think to look for you back where this all started?"

Stiles can tell how much Derek likes the idea, so he keeps his werewolfy mouth shut and his opinion to himself.


	4. Keeping Watch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Late night conversations and an almost kiss.

Derek sits next to the motel room window, peering through the break between the curtains at the dark parking lot. He hears the change in Stiles' breathing that says he's waking up, but doesn't bother to turn around to check on him. It's the middle of the night. Maybe he'll fall asleep on his own.

He doesn't. Instead he comes and sits across the table from Derek and says quietly, "Hey." It's just like every other time Stiles has found him keeping watch in the middle of the night, except this time they're in unfamiliar territory and it makes Derek's skin itch.

Derek nods, but doesn't reply out loud. Lydia's sleeping in the bed furthest from the window. She's been talking in her sleep all night, little mumbles and half-words about nothing that makes sense to him. He thinks she must need the sleep, because he's fairly certain she kept watch on Stiles the night before, while Derek had passed out on her kitchen floor for a few hours of rest. He'd like to do the same now, but someone has to keep watch.

"Dude, if you had a problem sharing the bed, I would have camped it out on the floor," Stiles says, picking at the edge of the table with his fingernail. 

"That's not it," Derek says, so quickly he surprises himself. He doesn't elaborate, though. Stiles doesn't need to know that Derek would like nothing better than to crawl into bed with him, just curl up with Stiles, and go to sleep. 

Stiles makes an understanding noise in his throat and asks, "Keeping watch, then, huh?"

Derek nods, like he always does. He's surprised when Stiles puts his chin in one palm and stares out the window as well. He looks sad. And why shouldn't he? Derek got everyone he loved, except for his father, killed. That thought heavy on his mind, Derek says what he's been meaning to all day, "I'm sorry."

Stiles blinks like he's half asleep again and asks, "For what?" His tone gives Derek the impression that Stiles thinks there are several things Derek could be apologizing for and he's genuinely curious which one Derek has chosen.

"For _everything_ ," Derek admits, letting his forehead fall against the cool window glass. There's nothing happening outside. Even though they're in a motel three towns away from Beacon Hills and Deaton gave them protective herbs and spells, Derek can't shake the feeling that as soon as he stops watching, something's going to happen.

Stiles sighs and gives Derek a tired, half-smile. "I know." He lets his hand fall forward on the table like he's expecting Derek to take it. He surprises himself by doing it. He slips his hand over Stiles' and grips his warm, sweaty palm.

Derek hears the way Stiles' heartbeat slows and feels the response of his own, catching up to beat in sync with his beta's. There's another thing to be sorry for: turning Stiles. He'd only ever wanted the bite if he was in mortal danger. I was Derek's fault he'd even been in that position in the first place. "If there had been any other way..." Derek says, squeezing Stiles' fingers.

Stiles nods and says, "I always knew it would happen eventually. Of course, I thought Scott and Erica and everyone would be here when it did. I should've known. You don't run with monsters without becoming one of them." He draws his hand away and Derek tries not to chase after him, letting him go like it's not difficult in the least. "What I don't get, though," Stiles says, crossing his arms over his chest, "Is why you gave that douchenozzle the bite. These new hunters blow into town and all of a sudden you turn one of them?"

Derek tried to choose his words carefully. He couldn't afford to have Stiles misunderstand him and get pissed off. Stiles was all he had left. Well, and Lydia, but he knew her association with them was temporary. When all this was over, she'd sweet talk her way back into med school and have no more use for him. "We had a deal. Kelly would get the power he needed to go after the demon that killed his father and we'd get a permanent alliance with his family."

Stiles' jaw drops and he asks, "Is stupidity a werewolf thing?" Lydia stirs across the room, so Stiles lowers his voice. "Am I going to get stupid? Like, start watching reality TV and make mistakes on my 1040-EZ? Jesus, Derek! You didn't even consider that the bite might kill him, did you?"

"No," Derek admits. He shouldn't be letting his beta admonish him like this, especially a new one. But honestly, Derek feels like he deserves it. He's killed a man. He's killed a man and brought death down on his pack in return. "I thought..." Derek sighs. "He was young and healthy. It shouldn't have killed him. I thought I was protecting us."

Stiles closes his mouth at Derek's confession and frowns, but his eyebrows do that sympathetic tilt-thing and he feels like sympathy instead of frustration. He sighs and then points at Derek and says, "So, listen. I'm your pack now and I get that you're the leader or whatever and that's great. It's awesome. The way you pulled me back from ... today. Good stuff."

Even though Stiles pauses, Derek can tell that he has more to say. "But?"

"But when it comes to the big decisions, would you at least let me help? Like _talk_ to me about it before you go off making rash decisions that could get people I care about hurt. By which I mean me," Stiles adds with a wry smile. "I care about myself, like, _a lot_ , so..."

Derek thinks about what Stiles is asking for a moment. He probably doesn't know how involved Boyd and Erica had been in his decision making process the last few years. Even Isaac had weighed in on occasion. Jackson was always too bullheaded to be asked his opinion and then have it dismissed when a better solution came up and Scott didn't like leaving Derek the final word either. It was right for a pack to be involved, to counsel their leader. When Derek's grandmother had been Alpha, she always asked everyone what they would do in her shoes, even the children. Somehow, he's forgotten that.

Before Derek can answer, the lamp across the room flicks on and Lydia sits up in bed. "Me too," she says, sliding out of bed to stand up and walk toward them. She's wearing a t-short and underwear, but nothing else and Derek's body notices the curve of one breast under the cotton of her shirt and a sharp flare of desire runs through him before he can stamp down the reaction. Lydia crosses her arms over her chest and says, "I may not be a werewolf, but I'm in this now. I need to be involved in the decision-making. I'm not going to stand by and let you two decide to make me bait or something."

"We'd _never_ ," Stiles insists, before he makes a weird face and sniffs the air. Stiles looks over at Derek with his eyebrows raised for half a second before diverting his attention back to Lydia. "You're the brains of the operation," he insists and Derek wonders what could have made Stiles pause like that. "If anything, _I'm_ the bait. Derek's the muscle."

Lydia looks back and forth between Derek and Stiles with a frown on her lips, but she doesn't argue. Instead, she sits on the edge of the bed nearest to them, crosses one thigh over the other, and says, "Alright, so let's come up with a plan."

Derek's already spoken to Deaton about this, so he says, "Stay here under the protective spells for a few days so they lose our trail. Then take care of them, starting at the top."

"Wait," Stiles says, throwing an arm out to point at Derek. "You're going to kill an old lady because she's grieving her son?"

"She had her men kill the pack," Derek says in reply. "They almost killed _you_ and they're not going to just let us go, so..."

Derek notices Lydia sitting with her palm open in her lap, looking at it like it has offended her. Derek moves a little into her line of sight and asks, "What do you think, Lydia?"

"I think it's a good thing I haven't taken the hippocratic oath yet," she says, still staring at her hand before she blinks a few times and looks up. "We need to make sure she takes the blame. For Jackson and Scott and Allison, for shooting up the mall back there, for everything. She can't do that if she's dead, as much as I would like to tear her to shreds with my bare hands. I ... I want her dead and I don't even know her name."

"Harriet," Derek supplies, Lydia's absent, then bloodthirsty demenor making an uneasy pit form in his stomach. "Harriet McCaffery."

Lydia nods and Derek can practically see her storing the name away for later. Then she says, "Stiles. What would your Dad need to make all this legal shit go away? So we can be cleared and go home?"

"Our statements," Stiles says. "Physical evidence tying her people to the murders." His breath hitches so slightly that Derek's sure Lydia couldn't notice, but Derek does. He has to remember that they're all grieving, that it wasn't just Derek who lost his pack. "Witnesses. If I could get a laptop, I could reroute a video call to my dad, really get the scoop on how the investigation is going, without them being able to find us. Well, unless they call the FBI or something, and no one was killed on federal land or took a minor across state lines, so it's really not their jurisdiction, unless a group of hunters count as the mob, which they might if they try racketeering now that there's no pack in Beacon Hills to stop them–"

"Stiles!" Lydia cries with a frustrated huff. "We have the room phone. We have Deaton's burner cell number. We'll get him to talk to your dad."

"Oh," Stiles says with a nod, meeting Derek's eyes for a second and looking embarrassed that he'd run on like that. Derek knew he only ever stopped using sentences when he was really excited or really nervous, and with the full moon coming up in a few days, Derek needs to get to the bottom of whatever's making him feel like this. He hopes it's something simple, but Derek knows it's probably the situation they're in and Stiles will be battling his feelings about that at the same time he's battling the pull of the moon for the first time.

Derek says, "We'll call Deaton in the morning for an update. In the mean time, you two should get some more rest."

Lydia shrugs and then takes a sharp breath before saying, "I have to visit the little girls' room first."

Derek watches her flounce off, which seems like it would take far too much energy for this time of night. She's taking it. Her smell reeks of worry and exhaustion. He wonders how much of what he knows about Lydia is an act.

When the bathroom door closes, Stiles says with a resigned tone, "Please don't."

Is Derek supposed to know what he's taking about, or is this one of Stiles' leaps in logic that he expects everyone to follow along with him? "Don't what?"

Stiles doesn't meet Derek's eyes as he murmurs, "I know I don't have a shot with her and I never did, but if I have to sit here and watch you two start something and not be able to leave because you're my alpha now, I think I'm gonna lose my fucking mind!"

"Me and _Lydia_?" Derek asks, seriously surprised that Stiles would jump to that conclusion. Though, now that he thinks about it, Derek supposes Stiles isn't so far off in thinking that Lydia is his type. She's beautiful and intelligent and ruthless, but also broken in a way that Derek needs because there's no way he will inflict himself on someone who's whole. Mostly Derek is impressed that Stiles had been able to pick up on a momentary attraction in Derek's scent. Maybe Stiles is just reading things all wrong, his new senses confusing him. It had been known to happen before. "Why would you think that?"

"Because," Stiles scoffs, picking at the table again, working his fingernail under the wood-pattern veneer. "You were all couple-y earlier at the car lot and you're attracted to each other. Why not? I mean it's been, what? Four years since you've had a girlfriend? Five?"

"Five," Derek agrees, thinking about Aida with that familiar grief he knows so well. "And we both remember how that turned out. I _wouldn't_ , Stiles."

Of course, Stiles has to keep pushing the subject, like pressing on a wound to gauge by the pain just how well it's healing. "But she's so pretty and you're so _you_ and I know what I smelled, buddy!"

Derek hears the way Stiles' heart speeds up, pushing him to the brink of panic and probably shifting and this is going to be a thing now, isn't it? With a sigh, Derek gets out of his chair and crouches down in front of Stiles, taking his hands away from the table and holding them tightly. "Look at me," Derek commands, letting out some of his power so that Stiles will feel it and see it. Stiles stills in Derek's hold. Derek takes a breath and thinks about what Laura said to him all those years ago. "It's just you and me now, okay? I'll do whatever's best for both of us, alright? If that means not starting something with Lydia, then I won't. Not that I'd even considered it. You don't intend on dating every girl you find attractive, do you?"

"No," Stiles replies, almost petulantly, like he hates that Derek made a good point. "You'd really do that for me?"

_What wouldn't I do for you?_ , Derek thinks, but he says out loud, "Yeah, of course." He watches the way Stiles' face softens and fights back the urge to trace his features with eager fingertips. Just because he's Stiles' alpha now, doesn't mean the intimate gesture would be welcomed. Not yet, if ever.

Stiles takes a long breath, to calm himself Derek supposes, and then stops toward the end of his inhale. He lets out a whoosh of air and then sniffs again. "What does that mean?" he asks.

Face feeling a little warm as he answers, Derek lies, "Nothing. I'm just worried about you. The full moon is coming up and we're stuck in such tight quar-"

"No," Stiles interrupts. "No, that's not..." He frees his hands from Derek's and puts them on either side of Derek's face so he can't look away without pulling stupidly hard. Stiles meets his eyes and his brows raise steadily upward before he whispers, "Derek?"

The moment feels tense with possibility. Stiles is sensing more from Derek than he ever could before and maybe Derek should be trying harder to mask his feelings, but he is just so tired. Stiles is there and he's pack now and even if he doesn't want Derek back, he's going to find out eventually. Might as well be now. 

Except Stiles isn't backing away, he's moving closer, his eyes on Derek's lips. Derek takes a surprised breath and then the bathroom door opens, Lydia traipsing back into the room. Derek tries not to be offended when Stiles shoves him away and stands up, mumbling, "My turn." 

Derek sits flat on his ass on the grungy motel carpet, Stiles locks himself in the bathroom, and Lydia raises an eyebrow. "What ... the hell ... was that?"

Derek isn't quite sure what to say, so it takes him a moment of carefully not looking at how Lydia really should be wearing more clothes, because Derek can't afford to have Stiles smelling things that don't mean anything, to come up with, "Pack stuff."

"Oh, uh-huh," she replies, getting back into bed and switching off the light beside her bed. In the darkness, she breathes steadily and Derek focuses on listening to Stiles in the bathroom. 

It sounds like he's lightly thudding something against the mirror, and if Derek had to guess, he would say it's Stiles' forehead that's taking the brunt of the meltdown. Derek wants to go tap on the door, to let himself in there and pull Stiles away from the glass and hold him again until he calms down, but he doesn't. He does pull himself onto the other bed and lay down, though, because suddenly the lack of sleep catches up with him.

Across the room, Lydia says quietly, "Derek?"

"Yeah?"

"If you hurt him, I'll cut you in half myself."

Derek smiles and it feels nice on his lips. Not as nice as a kiss from Stiles would have, but nice all the same. "Got it."


	5. The Driest Martini

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lydia only wants one thing - a drink.

"Would you stop pacing already?" Lydia complains, dropping her hair from where she's been twirling it with her fingers. "You're giving me a headache."

To be fair, it's probably not Stiles' hyperactivity giving Lydia the headache, but the fact that it's been almost 48 hours since her last drink. Trust handy-dandy Dr. Deaton to chose a cheap motel with no minibar and no room service. It makes their money stretch further, sure, but Lydia can't keep her hands from shaking unless she clutches them tightly around her arms. And slipping out to find the nearest liquor store isn't an option when her companions are more paranoid than Lydia's Uncle Hank, the conspiracy theorist. 

Derek has been ducking out to random food establishments and the grocery store to bring back nourishment, but when Lydia asks him to bring back a bottle of wine or some beer the first day, he refuses, saying, "We need to be clear headed."

She is too ashamed to admit that she won't be clear headed _until_ that first glass of wine. Werewolves just don't understand when their bodies metabolize alcohol far too quickly to feel the effects. Not that Lydia feels much of an effect anymore, besides not going into withdrawal like this. Her brain is used to working under increased levels of dopamine and this sudden drop off just is not working for her.

Stiles turns to speak to Lydia, probably to tell her why he can't stop pacing like a hyperactive hamster, but then he goes still and cocks his head. Werewolves. Can't live with them, can't seem to get rid of them. "Derek needs me," he says, even though Lydia hasn't heard anything. "Something weird down the block. Stay here."

And then he' gone and Lydia is left to herself again – with no one to tell her exactly what "something weird" is supposed to mean and only three channels on the TV. Not that she can stomach the TV at the moment. 

_You know what?_ Lydia thinks to herself after ten minutes of trying to take a nap and failing. _This is bullshit and I don't have to put up with it._

Lydia makes sure her protective amulet is secure around her neck, puts on the least conspicuous clothes that managed to make the trip to the motel (Deaton still won't agree to bring more), and jots down a note on the pad next to the telephone.

_Out for supplies, back before 5_ , she writes, adding a little smiley face just for panache. Then Lydia leaves the motel room and sets off down the street toward the bar she'd seen on their way in. She has plenty of cash for a drinking trip (though most of it is in the motel room safe) and plans on getting herself the driest martini this side of the Mississippi as soon as she walks in the door.

She manages to make it the five blocks down a very busy highway of a street without werewolves stopping her or breaking a heel, so Lydia is in better spirits by the time she pushes her way into "Dale's Bar and Grill." To be honest, Lydia prefers cocktail lounges to anything grill-adjacent, but beggars cannot be choosers and she feels like the thirstiest woman in the world.

The bartender, a man with white balding hair that doesn't match the smooth friendliness of his face and a gut that hangs six inches too far over his belt, calls to Lydia as soon as she enters the bar, "Sit anywhere you like, sweetheart." He says "sweetheart" in the way a grandfather would, rather than a letch, and it puts Lydia at ease almost instantly. 

She sits at the bar gracefully, flipping her bangs away from her face with one hand and says, "Martini, gin. _Very_ dry. Please!" She finishes off her request with a bright, doe-eyed smile and sees the moment the bartender melts in her hand. 

"You got it!" The bartender takes a shaker out from under the bar and pours in a generous measure of gin, which makes Lydia's mouth water. He shakes a bottle of vermouth in that general direction without actually adding any.

"Why do you do that?" Lydia asks. She's been curious before, but never enough to ask or look it up.

The bartender smiles as he adds an olive and slides the cocktail across the bar to Lydia. In a stage whisper he answers, "So the other ingredients don't get nervous." Lydia laughs and shakes her head as the bartender walks away toward another patron, who's holding up an empty pint glass. 

Since one of the symptoms of alcohol withdrawal is nausea, Lydia hasn't eaten much that day. If this whole on-the-run with no alcohol _thing_ is going to be her life now, Lydia thinks it's best to limit herself to this one martini, just to make the next few weeks bearable. Of course, she knows the rationalization well. She also knows the rationalizations for the next drink and the one after that better than the back of her hand. To stave off the probably-inevitable, Lydia makes it a game. She limits herself to one delicious, life-affirming sip every two minutes, by the clock high on the wall behind the bar. It's a nice rate that shouldn't get her buzzed, just ease the headache a little.

Eight sips and sixteen minutes in, a young man sits down next to Lydia. He's wearing dirty jeans and boots, but his shirt is a nice short-sleeved polo. She pegs him as a construction worker just off a shift that started early in the morning. His smile is nice and even though he's holding a long neck, his breath doesn't smell like alcohol when he says, "Hi."

Lydia contemplates brushing him off, telling him she wants to be left alone or that she's meeting someone, but he looks nice and she can read the writing on the wall that is Stiles and Derek. She knows it's foolish to think that she'll be able to return to her former life, to return to any sort of stable life. Lydia will be part of their three-person pack, but she won't be a werewolf and she won't be _with_ either of them. Maybe once things settle down again and Derek stops making stupid decisions, Lydia will be free to leave and pursue her own life. She might as well take comfort where she can, while she can. 

"Well, hello," she says, with a carefully measured smile – just enough to keep Mr. Contractor muscles on the hook.

"Hey," he says, returning her smile. "You're awfully pretty to be in a place like this."

"I'm not," she says, reminded of the fact that all of the beauty supplies she'd scrounged the first day got left in the van at the outlet mall and she's been making do with the motel amenities. "But it's sweet of you to say so."

"I'm Andy," he says, holding out his hand. Lydia gives it a firm shake.

"Lydia."

Andy smiles. "I don't know any other Lydias. It mean something?"

"Just that my mother has read _Pride and Prejudice_ far too many times," Lydia tells him, pushing away the thought that she hasn't seen her mother in almost two years. She might not see her ever again. Of course, it's been almost five years since she's seen her father, so he's not even worth thinking about. Obviously.

"At least you weren't named after your aunt," Andy says with a laugh and Lydia can't help but let out a chuckle of her own.

She takes her ninth sip and leans a little toward him. "So, is your legal name Andrea or something?"

He laughs and takes the first swallow of beer Lydia has seen from him. "No. Just ... Andy."

"Well, _Andy_ , tell me about your day so far. Good day? Bad day? Room for improvement?"

They chat about Andy's job (pouring concrete) and the weather and eventually start discussing the pros and cons of watching old Nickelodeon cartoons before bed. It strikes Lydia as all very normal and she keeps taking one sip every two minutes until Andy distracts her with a story about being the best man at his brother's wedding and how he lost the ring. 

Suddenly it's been almost five minutes since sip seventeen. Lydia's martini glass is almost empty, so she puts her hand up to get the bartender's attention (for another martini or a soda, she hasn't decided yet). Before the bartender sees her, Stiles bursts into the bar, bearing his new fangs. Without so much as a warning, he grabs Andy off his stool and growls into his face, " _Mine_!" 

Andy gasps in surprise and fairly obvious terror, but he doesn't squeak or whine, which earns him points in Lydia's book. Of course, her book is a little full at the moment with an out-of-control werewolf who apparently won't even let her have a drink with another man. Freaking fantastic.

"Stiles!" she cries in the voice that always used to work on Jackson. It's a bit like talking to an attack dog, which is dehumanizing but it works. Stiles turns to look at her. "Let him go _right now_! And what have I told you about wearing that mask _in public_?"

Stiles tilts his head and it takes a moment of Lydia staring him down, but then his eyes widen in understanding and he lets go of Andy. Of course Derek picks that moment to burst in. All five patrons of the bar are staring, so Lydia yells at Derek, "I thought you were keeping an eye on him! You know how much that _mask_ of his unnerves people!" She gestures to the witnesses. Andy's eyes are so wide that Lydia's fairly certain he doesn't believe a word she says.

Stiles takes a step back from Andy and Derek grabs him by the shoulders, hauling him back even further. Frowning at Lydia, Derek growls, "When you weren't in the room when we got back, he freaked out. Let's go." Without further ado, Derek grabs Stiles at the back of his neck and physically pulls him out of the bar. Lydia sighs in relief when Stiles makes it out the door without losing his wolf face. If he had, his appearance would have been much more difficult to explain.

Lydia pulls a twenty from the small roll in her pocket and slips it onto the bar as she tells Andy, "I'm so sorry. My brother was in an accident and has severe brain damage. Unfortunately it's not so severe that he doesn't remember how to do monster make-up. Sorry."

As Lydia flees, she hears Andy say softly, "It's okay," like it's not at all okay.

When she gets outside, Lydia sees their current car, a red Kia, parked haphazardly in front of the building. Stiles sits in the back, head sheepishly bowed, while Derek approaches the driver's side door. He frowns at Lydia over the roof of the car and growls, "Get in."

Lydia entertains for just a moment the thought of refusing and running off, but sighs and gets in the car anyway.

"We're going to have to pack up everything quickly and move," Derek says, his body language betraying how furious he must be. He pulls out of the bar parking lot with a squeal of the tires and asks, "Why couldn't you just stay put?"

"I had a headache," Lydia says, her tone clipped and sharp. "I was going to head back in a few minutes."

"You disappeared!"

"I left a _note_!" Lydia notices that Stiles has been unusually quiet. Well, he should be. His lack of control ruined a perfectly nice conversation for her. Turning in her seat to look at Stiles, Lydia asks, "What was with all that 'mine' bullshit back there? I don't belong to you!"

"I'm _sorry_ ," Stiles says, actually sounding much more repentant than Lydia expects. "This is all really new, okay? I didn't see a note and I panicked and I just ... _instinct_ , man. I saw you with that guy and I couldn't stop myself from flipping out."

Lydia turns to Derek as he pulls up outside their motel room and asks, "Can't you control him? Or are we going to have to find a leash?"

Lydia doesn't wait for an answer before flinging her car door open and stalking toward the room. She doesn't want to belong to these werewolves, but the fact is that she does. She's pack. And the saddest part is, if she really wanted to leave, she could. It would be easy. No, Lydia _belongs_ with them because she loved Jackson and she loved Allison and she grew to love the whole pack before she left them in a pique of pride or independent spirit or whatever the fuck she'd called it in the two years she'd spent either justifying her decision or drinking it away.

A tear hangs from the tip of her nose and Lydia's hands are shaking by the time she gets to the motel room door. She can't steady them well enough to get the key card in the fucking lock and when a hand lands lightly on her shoulder, Lydia whirls around and cries, "I _hate_ this!" She pounds a fist against Stiles' chest and he takes it without flinching. Like they always do. "God, I hate this so much! I'm twenty-three years old! My biggest worry should be waking up in time to make rounds and whether my hair looks cute when I go out with my friends! I shouldn't be running for my life and coming down from a two-year-long bender my liver will _never_ forgive me for!"

One of Stiles' arms slides around Lydia's shoulder, pulling her close, and he murmurs, "I'm sorry."

Her forehead against Stiles' chest, Lydia nods. She hears Derek's careful footsteps approach, like he's giving them a moment they don't have to spare. Which they don't. Lydia knows this. She knows Derek started a war between his pack and the largest hunter organization west of Texas. She knows word of Stiles' outburst will spread and the hunters will find them. She knows she'll be dead before Stiles, and maybe Derek if he fights hard enough that they have to put him down instead of showing him fresh corpses and letting him loose again to mourn anew. The morbid part of Lydia's brain wonders if it's possible for a werewolf to kill himself. Probably, she decides, if he's creative enough.

There's no time to waste on this weakness, so Lydia pulls herself together and holds her key out toward Derek, stepping away from the door so he can unlock it. It's only after they've packed and Lydia's sitting in the back seat of the Kia, alone, that she whispers, "Thank you for trying to rescue me, even if there was no need."

Stiles nods back at her, his eyebrows repentant and his retinas flashing reflected light from the headlights of the car behind them. Derek grunts, "Of course."


	6. Chapter 6

Stiles watches Derek survey their new motel room, fifty miles from the last one and seventy five from the one they abandoned after Lydia went AWOL and Stiles was seen. It's far enough from the last place they'd been spotted, but still close enough to Beacon Hills that it feels like they aren't so far from home. Derek frowns and says, "There's nowhere good to lock you up. We're going to need chains."

Stiles hates the idea of being chained up. It makes him want to hold his breath until his lungs feel like they're going to catch fire and drop out of his chest. So he does what he always does and makes a joke. He catches Lydia's eye and waggles his eyebrows. She drops her shopping bag full of toiletries onto the bed nearest the bathroom and rolls her eyes at him.

Sighing, Stiles turns his attention to Derek and asks, "What are you going to chain me up to? The toilet or something?"

Derek shakes his head. "You'll just pull the plumbing out and cause a flood and we'll have to move again. No, I think," Derek pokes around the room some more, checking the corners and the ceiling. "I think the bed. If we take away enough leverage, it should hold."

Stiles can't help but laugh. "You're going to chain me to _the bed_? Yeah, because that's normal."

Derek's frown deepens and Stiles gets a wash of frustration from him as he advances on Stiles a few steps. "Nothing about this is _normal_! You shouldn't even be–"

Stiles doesn't get to hear what he shouldn't be because Lydia steps between them and says, "Okay, boys. I know tonight's the full moon and that always makes everyone a little grumpy, but can we take it down a notch? Please?"

"It's fine," Derek says, but his nostrils flare widely and he still feels angry and powerful in a way that makes Stiles want to bare his throat in one second, and want to lunge at Derek and bruise his damn pride in the next. "I'm going to the hardware store. You two _stay here_."

Stiles doesn't like the way Derek's tone implies that Lydia would make the same mistake twice and run off again, so he puts his arm around Lydia's shoulders and says, "Yeah, don't worry, _boss_. We got it."

Lydia shrugs Stiles' arm away and approaches Derek carefully. She puts a hand on Derek's forearm the way Stiles has seen her do with Jackson more times than he can count. The strange thing is that it works. The tension drains away from Derek's shoulders and he sighs as Lydia assures him, "We'll be fine. Just get back before the moon rises."

"Yeah," Derek says, his voice distracted almost. Distant. He shakes his head and meets Stiles' eyes. After an aborted movement, like he wants to reach for Stiles but then thinks better of it, Derek says, "I won't be gone long. Deaton might come to help set up the protection spells. Wait for me before you let him in."

Then he's out the door and Stiles has no clue what is going on. Yeah, he feels the pressure of the full moon, he's been feeling it since the day before. He doesn't know why Derek seems so mad at him, though. As soon as Derek's car pulls away, Stiles asks Lydia, "What do you think I did to piss him off this time?"

Lydia shrugs one shoulder as she finishes locking the door and paints a stripe from the wall, across the door, and to the other side with the potion Deaton gave them a few days ago. "I don't think he's angry at you," she says, screwing the brush back into the tin bottle that holds the potion. "I think it's the situation. Having to deal with the full moon _now_ , when there's already so much shit going on."

Stiles rarely hears Lydia swear, so he can't help but smile at it now. He watches as she takes a deep breath and presses her hand to the line she painted. It doesn't flare visibly, but Stiles can feel the way the air changes and pulls on the hairs at the back of his neck. He wishes he could still activate wards, still feel that power rush of knowing that he could _do something_. He can't, though. Not now that he's no longer human.

"There," she says with a happy flourish. "Safe and sound."

She smiles at Stiles, and part of him knows that it's a pasted-on smile, a mask to hide the weariness that they've all been feeling, but part of him doesn't care either. Because Lydia-freaking-Martin is smiling at him with her perfect lips and her perfect teeth and the perfect way she flips her hair back away from her perfect cheek. Okay, so Stiles knows that Lydia isn't actually perfect. He knows that she has some pretty major flaws, but he's finding it hard to think of them right now. He's finding it hard to think about Derek and their almost kiss and Derek's promises to be there for Stiles and only Stiles.

The moon is energy running through Stiles' body, full of purpose and promises and potential. God, he feels _electric_. Alive. Stiles can't help but return Lydia's smile as he steps toward her and promises, "You're always safe with me."

He reaches forward to cup her cheek the way he's dreamed of for what feels like _centuries_ or maybe even forever, but Lydia is already laughing and brushing his hand away. "Yeah, okay, Mr. Wanted to Bite My Face Off the Other Day." She's still grinning as she plops down onto her bed, and Stiles knows she didn't intend to offend him, but his heart feels cracked by the truth of the situation nonetheless. 

Maybe Lydia has never and will never love him the way Stiles used to (and still somewhat does) love her, but at least before she was always _safe_ around him. She isn't now. Stiles knows this. It makes him angry.

But anger isn't safe anymore. Not with the full moon rising and Stiles' heart beating just a little too fast. So he does what he can and laughs. "I know, right? That was crazy!"

Lydia's face turns concerned and she sits up, scooting closer to him. "Stiles, your eyes."

He looks over at the mirror above the desk and sees that his eyes are glowing yellow. "Shit," he says, closing his eyes and focusing on breathing. It's just like staving off a panic attack, right? Must be, because after a few more breaths, the tense feeling in his skin fades away. "Okay. I think I'm good."

"Good," Lydia says, watching him like he's an insect under her magnifying glass. "Because I don't want to end up spattered around this hotel room because you got hungry."

Stiles rolls his eyes and sits down next to Lydia. "C'mon. Gimme a little credit. As long as I know it's you, I'm not going to eat you."

Lydia purses her lips for a moment and then replies, "You seem awfully confident of that fact. How can you be so sure?"

" _Because_ ," Stiles says, feeling himself blush, but ignoring it. "Scott's first full moon, he couldn't hurt Allison."

"But Scott was in love with Allison," Lydia says. She meets his eyes and Stiles gives a little shrug. Stiles thinks that even if he has seen a few people in his life, he'll always be a little in love with Lydia Martin. She frowns and points a finger at him. "No. Stop that right now."

"What?" Stiles asks, putting his hands up to show his innocence. "So I love you. That's nothing new. And the other day when I first changed, you're the one who talked me down."

Lydia stares at Stiles for a moment, her eyes big and green and beautiful. Then she nods. "As long as we both understand that even if you do love me, I don't owe you anything. My feelings are my own and you don’t have any say in them. You got that?"

The diatribe catches Stiles off guard, so it takes him a moment to process her words. Basically, she doesn't love Stiles back and is demanding he not give her shit for it, right? That's what he gets out of it anyway, and it's fine. Stiles knows Lydia doesn't love him. Can't love him. He lived in hope for a few months after she and Jackson split, but when she didn't really respond to any of his emails or texts, he figured it was a lost cause. Still a lost cause, then. And Stiles has that almost-kiss with Derek to focus his romantic energies on now. He doesn't need Lydia. He doesn't need Lydia. Maybe if he repeats it in his mind often enough and long enough, his heart will finally get the message. "Yeah. I got it. We're good."

"Good," Lydia replies. They sit side by side in silence and eventually Lydia draws up one of her legs, resting her chin on her knee. "Can I ask you something?"

Stiles looks over at Lydia's profile. She's staring off in the distance past the hideous wallpaper and her cheekbone is sharper than Stiles remembers it being. She looks older. "Yeah," he says, clearing his throat to make his voice work. "Yeah, sure. Anything."

"Even if it's about Jackson?"

Stiles fights the urge to scoff. Just rip his heart out and stomp on it, why don't you? But Lydia needs him to be here for her, even if she doesn't need him to love her, so Stiles says, "Yeah, fine. What do you want to know?"

"Did he ... move on?" she asks, and her voice sounds thick.

An empathetic slice of pain hits Stiles' heart and he can't help but reach over and put his arm around Lydia. "Not that I ever saw," Stiles assures her, squeezing Lydia's opposite arm in comfort. "I don't think so."

"Am I a bitch for being happy about that?" she asks, smiling, but there's a tear falling down the cheek Stiles can see. "Like, I _had_ to leave. And I had to leave him behind. But I'm so glad he didn't find anyone new, either. So fucking glad."

"Sounds pretty human, to me," Stiles says, trying not to be obvious about breathing in the scent of Lydia's hair. "And, you know, up until a few days ago, I used to be an expert on the whole human condition ... thing."

Lydia laughs and nods as she brushes her cheeks dry. She finally looks over at Stiles and nudges him with her shoulder. "What about you? Any one special, besides–" Lydia nods her chin toward the motel room door, in a gesture that Stiles understands is referencing Derek. 

"Dated a few people," Stiles shrugs. "There was always werewolf shit getting in the way, so nothing really stuck."

"And Derek?"

Stiles shrugs. "I mean, I've kinda had a boner for him for awhile now. I just figured he didn't... But then there was the other night when we almost kissed, but nothing really since then and– Okay, I don't have a clue."

Humming in acknowledgement, Lydia presses closer against Stiles' side. "I think it's good. I think you're good for each other."

"Yeah, maybe," Stiles says, but in the pit of his stomach, he can tell he has doubts. "Like, what if it's just because we're forming a new pack? What if human-me wouldn't have had these feelings? What if it's not _real_?"

Lydia reaches toward her bag on the bed and pulls out a magazine, promptly using it to bop Stiles on the nose.

"Ow, hey!" Stiles protests. "What was that for?"

"Stop over thinking this, Stiles," she says, tossing the magazine back toward one of the end tables. "Do you really think Scott becoming a werewolf changed how he might have thought about Allison? Do you think Jackson being bit made him love me?"

Stiles scoffs. "No. That's just plai–" "So, the logical conclusion is that becoming a werewolf hasn't changed your feelings. Either they were there before, or they would have developed with or without your special wolfy bond."

Stiles sees Lydia's point, but he still can't damp down on the fear that Derek's going to get tired of Stiles sooner rather than later. So, he scoffs. "Like feelings are that easy to logic into submission."

Lydia smirks, but Stiles thinks her eyes look sad. "You'd be surprised."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably my favorite chapter so far. Hope you liked it!


End file.
